The Excruciatingly Slow US Economic Recovery In 7 Charts

The world economy is slowing down, threatening the 36-month long U.S.recovery.Dinah Walker, a geoeconomic analyst at the Council on Foreign Relations, published a quarterly update to her chartbook that tracks the progress of various economic indicators as the U.S. has emerged out of recession over the past few years.

The charts show that by many measures, this is still the worst recovery on record from any recession in the U.S. since after World War Two.

The dotted lines in the charts represent the performance of the indicators in the best and worst recoveries since WWII while the red lines and blue lines compare the indicators’ progress in the current recovery versus the post-war average.

Thanks to Council on Foreign Relations for allowing us to feature their charts.

The recovery in GDP has been well below average and is about to become the worst since WWII

The recovery in housing is by far the worst since WWII, given its central role in the crash

Household deleveraging is also the slowest since WWII–in fact, the U.S. has relevered

The recovery in industrial capacity is also the worst since WWII but has turned upward, though still negative

The federal deficit as a per cent of GDP is the greatest since any recovery post-WWII

Industrial production has been tracking just below the post-WWII recovery average

World trade volume is one bright spot, having staged the strongest recovery since WWII until recently